ELIZABETH ALICE (WILES) KATZ Nov. 14, 1939 – Nov. 6, 2022
Elizabeth Alice (Wiles) Katz – alternatively known as Betty, Beth, Betsy, or GG – passed away Nov. 6, 2022 at her home surrounded by family and her devoted caregiver Ingrid Baez.
She was born November 14, 1939 in Watertown, MA.
On Betty’s desk a plaque declares, “I am silently correcting your grammar” – so please read on knowing she would aggressively redline everything below (and probably is at this very moment).
Betty worked from an early age, including a teenage stint operating an elevator at a department store in Boston’s Downtown Crossing. Later as a mother she would torture her children by taking them into the mayhem of Filene’s Basement. Her children retaliated by owning dogs.
Betty’s life was also marked by a lifelong passion for teaching writing, literature and English – at UNM-Los Alamos and Lake Braddock High School (Virginia) in particular. She also wrote and edited a wide range of scientific and educational books, trying (often in vain) to get scientists around the world (looking at you, LANL and IAEA) to write concisely.
She was the proud owner and liberal user of an ink stamp depicting a banana and the words “elongated yellow fruit,” which was deployed against all offenders who dared write more words than necessary. The stamp’s demise at the hands of the personal computer and email was surely a milestone in her life. Likely she would have applied it to this obituary.
She was a fiercely proud graduate of Albertus Magnus College in New Haven and received her Masters in Literature from American University.
Betty was preceded in death by her husband Mauri Katz who she married in 1987. Together they lived in Vienna, Austria and Washington D.C. before building a home in Tesuque, NM – a home that would become the family gathering place for decades.
Betty is survived by her three children: Stephen Dean III (Piedmont, CA), Richy Dean (Los Angeles), and Marcy Rossi (Western Springs, IL), their spouses and 7 grandchildren. Her brothers (the late Richard and James Wiles) and their extended families originating in Tivoli, NY and Wellesley, MA were especially dear to her and she cherished each visit from them to her home in Tesuque and at their homes on Cape Cod each summer. Her frequent gifts of crazy socks will be missed by her family of all ages.
Donations can be made in Betty’s name to the following charities:
A celebration and remembrance of Betty’s life will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday Dec. 3 at the Santa Fe Four Seasons Rancho Encantado.
